GAD BY DESIGN - Defining design
Eindhoven, Netherlands
January 2022
January 2022
Exploring what design can constitue, “Gad by Design” tries to understand how design shapes the designer and not the other way around. With a starting point in defining the practise as such, it then moves on to explore different mediums within the field.
A manifesto; The manifesto is the foundation of the practise, showing how the designer is influenced by design itself and how design shapes, instead of being shaped. The designer becomes an agent under influence from their surroundings, and can act based on this. It reflects a way to rationalise studying within an academy of the arts, trying to find a way forward within a system that promotes a certain kind of thinking but not others. In order to learn as much as possible within the institution, certain parameters are set up in order for the designer to act freely and to explore design. A foundation of values to rest upon.
A stool; The stool is a reflection of the manifesto. Trying to incorporate the values that has been established through the learning process the stool is a way to embody that. Using simplicity to let a message shine through, the purpose of a stool might seem obvious. Allowing for seating, it tries to convey a message through irony, using catalogues advertising a black friday sale made by a furniture brand. The catalogues was collected from the trash.
A performance; As an attempt to use design as something where the object being made is not at the center of the design process. Allowing multiple people to participate and making sure that the action of creating, not the creation itself, is preeminent, design takes a new shape. Showing the possiilities design has when one re-evaluates it as a tool opens up for new approaches to it as a practise.
In all, “Gad by Design” tries to show the complexity of design, its possibilities and its multiplicity, through two completely different outcomes, stemming from the same fundamental idea.
A manifesto; The manifesto is the foundation of the practise, showing how the designer is influenced by design itself and how design shapes, instead of being shaped. The designer becomes an agent under influence from their surroundings, and can act based on this. It reflects a way to rationalise studying within an academy of the arts, trying to find a way forward within a system that promotes a certain kind of thinking but not others. In order to learn as much as possible within the institution, certain parameters are set up in order for the designer to act freely and to explore design. A foundation of values to rest upon.
A stool; The stool is a reflection of the manifesto. Trying to incorporate the values that has been established through the learning process the stool is a way to embody that. Using simplicity to let a message shine through, the purpose of a stool might seem obvious. Allowing for seating, it tries to convey a message through irony, using catalogues advertising a black friday sale made by a furniture brand. The catalogues was collected from the trash.
A performance; As an attempt to use design as something where the object being made is not at the center of the design process. Allowing multiple people to participate and making sure that the action of creating, not the creation itself, is preeminent, design takes a new shape. Showing the possiilities design has when one re-evaluates it as a tool opens up for new approaches to it as a practise.
In all, “Gad by Design” tries to show the complexity of design, its possibilities and its multiplicity, through two completely different outcomes, stemming from the same fundamental idea.
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